And Thor speaks! We were awakened early Saturday morning by an unusual sound here, a full-on thunder-storm. Thunder and lightning… LOUD! We’ve had a much drier Summer than usual and even this storm heralded very little rain. This is just one of the pictures, in the slideshow in the King 5 article. Photo from King 5 News, Photo credit Anthony May

Last night, February 1st , we saw pipers, drummers and dancers from Scotland, Ireland, Canada and the US at Benaroya Hall in Seattle WA. The show is an annual thing and benefits the Celtic Arts Foundation and the related Winter School Programs. The foundation also sponsors other events including Burns Night, St Patrick’s Day, events at The Highland Games and a Scotch Tasting. Fred Morrison’s Kansas City Hornpipe including his funny story about the Newark Howard Johnson’s, John Scullion’s drum solo and Laura Risk’s Fiddle solo were real stand outs for me, but the entire show was excellent and all the performers and audience seemed to be having a great time. I have an extra copy of the very informative concert program that tells all about the performers and sponsors and also has a lot of historical information as well, just drop me a line if you’d like to borrow it. The show was great and I can’t urge you more strongly to get there next year!

How many earthquakes do we have in a year?

The USGS reports 22,289 earthquakes worldwide in 2011.

Washington and Southern California each have 30+ earthquakes per day. Do you know what experts say you should do to be prepared for one? The ShakeOut website gives the latest duck and cover recommendations and lists earthquake drills by region. October 18th is the day for Washington, California, Nevada, and British Columbia. The Central US has their drill in February, Utah in April. I picked this picture instead of a modern one because our house survived this. There is some evidence of subsidence that I believe was from this earthquake. Think you know what to do in an earthquake? You have probably heard of these techniques…

What NOT to do:

DO NOT get in a doorway! An early earthquake photo is a collapsed adobe home with the door frame as the only standing part. From this came our belief that a doorway is the safest place to be during an earthquake. In modern houses and buildings, doorways are no safer, and they do not protect you from flying or falling objects. Get under a table instead!

DO NOT run outside! Trying to run in an earthquake is dangerous, as the ground is moving and you can easily fall or be injured by debris or glass. Running outside is especially dangerous, as glass, bricks, or other building components may be falling. You are much safer to stay inside and get under a table.

DO NOT believe the so-called “triangle of life”! In recent years, an e-mail has circulated which has recommends potentially life threatening actions , and the source has been discredited by leading experts. I remember learning about this in a disaster drill when I worked at the clinic, here is a link about it: The Triangle of Life. One problem with this one is that there is far more danger from shattering glass and flying objects than from collapsing exterior walls.

The Olympians:

Spending the first weekend of the Olympics in Olympia was a fun coincidence. According to Greek Mythology, the Olympian gods are Hermes, Artemis, Hephaestus, Aphrodite, Zeus, Hera, Apollo, Ares, Athena, Poseidon, Hestia and Demeter. Hades was not usually included in lists although he is a brother of Zeus and Poseidon, etc. The Olympians are second generation gods who took over the earth, sky, ocean and underworld after defeating the Titans. The term “Olympian” refers to Mt Olympus. Each god has their own home, made by Hephaestus, the smith-god, but Mt Olympus is where they hold court. The Milky Way is called the road to Olympus. It bisects the ecliptic, or path of the Sun, which includes the constellations associated with the god’s homes, the Zodiac. Read the rest of this entry »

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Remember the old slogan, “Do the Puyallup?” Well, Rob did the Puyallup this weekend. He did his bit to represent TDI, Therapy Dogs International, with his buddies Nala, a Havanese, and Rowdy, a giant teddy bear in a St. Bernard suit. Clover, a lovely Dalmation, joined us later for the next “shift.” I played chauffer and Scott acted as his valet but this was his show and he did us all proud. He met more people than I could even keep count of and he actively engaged each kid who petted him with a sense of wonder while enduring the adults who heavy handedly patted him on the head. We didn’t get to go to PawsWalk because it was the same weekend but next year, I’d like to get a team together to walk PawsWalk under a TDI banner.

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We just spent the weekend at Wool in the Woods, the annual conference of the NwRSA, the Northwest Regional Spinners Association, at Pinelow Park in Loon Lake, WA which, by the way, takes the record for the longest distance I’ve ever driven a vehicle. This was a larger event than I expected — a lot of people, mostly women, attended and my fellow spinster from the Alaska cruise was there with her district as well as a few members of mine. The weather alternated between rain and sun and the temps were the same as we have been having in Seattle. I had signed us up for a tent-site because dogs were not allowed in cabins but the camping area was too soggy so the management allowed us dog-people to have them in the cabins after all.

The place was really nice — the setting was beautiful, the showers were clean, the beds were comfortable but the best part, of course, was the conference itself. I took classes on spinning angora, silk, slippery fibers and a technical class on twist, tension and wraps per inch. The other offerings were knitting techniques, basket weaving and classes on dyeing, including indigo, persimmon and other natural dyes. When I wasn’t in a class, I was usually at the seemingly 24hr spin-in going on in the main lodge. There were more wheels than I’ve ever seen before — whole herds of Lendrum and Ashfords and fiber and tool vendors. Scott somehow neglected to bring along one of the many hats I’ve knit him over the years and ended up buying a felted wool hat from Thistledown Shetlands and he surprised me with a beautiful yarn-bowl made by Sarah Alderete. I won a table swift provided by Paradise Fibers as a door prize and I bought a drop spindle from Spindlewood, a little maple one-yard niddy-noddy that matches my Journey Wheel from The Bellwether, some silk from Dyelots and some pure white angora from Margaret Gisselberg, the woman who taught the Angora class. She had sheep-wool, angora fiber and bunnies and yup, we have a new bunny. Her name is Freya and she is a 9 week old German-Satin hybrid. She is calm, poised and extremely well socialized and sat in my lap for hours each night while I participated in the spin-in. I may need to change my Etsy store name from Dunthor to Angora Addiction.

While I was doing all that, Scott and Rob were taking long walks in the woods and along the lake, taking long naps, loitering on the bench outside the lodge greeting everyone who went by and just hanging out together. Rob didn’t want to leave. I had to lift him into the truck — he wouldn’t jump up on his own. Little Freya rode about halfway home in the big crate next to Rob’s inside the truck canopy and the rest of the way in my lap. That makes her the only beast, besides Mom’s Freddy, who has ridden in the cab of my truck — everyone else rides in the back. Freya has her own bunny crate at home and is getting introduced to the cinna-buns very slowly. She is getting her exercise in the kitchen and I think she’d like Rob better if he’d quit tossing toys on her. He really wants her to play so he scootches up to her in a play bow pose and then lobs stuffed animals at her, LOL.

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Scott found a great park just North of Burien! The Salmon Creek Ravine Park is right off Ambaum and is well worth checking out. It is a hike, not a walk — the trails are unimproved gravel and wet leaves but you can meander through 88 acres of mature forest with a wild stream at the bottom of the ravine. It is so quiet that you’ll forget you are still in the Shorewood neighborhood. We didn’t meet up with a single other person but the cedars and sword ferns are huge and healthy looking and there are lots of good subjects for nature photography. Rob did an awful lot of running and sniffing and had a generally wonderful time.